Breaking the Rules

Photography has a lot of “rules” of composition to help you make a more pleasing image. These are very useful for the most part, but they should be taken as guidelines rather than something to follow religiously. Sometimes, doing something different or unconventional might be preferable. Besides, it’s just plain fun to break rules!

One of those rules is that you shouldn’t put the horizon across the centre of the frame. Conventional wisdom says that if the sky is more important, you should put the horizon lower to emphasize the sky. If the foreground is more important, place the horizon higher to minimize the sky. In this image, which we call Dune and Sky, we purposely put the horizon smack in the middle. But why?

We were photographing the amazing sand dunes of Namibia’s Namib-Naukluft National Park. Each morning, we left our camp before sunrise in order to be at the dunes in time to catch the rising sun saturate the reddish-orange sand, turning colours almost unreal shades. We already had a magical early morning of photography, then about an hour or so after sunrise, we noticed another change taking place. It was still early enough for the sand to remain a dazzling saturated orange, but now the slightly higher sun was turning the sky a brilliant blue. It was as if the blue and orange competed for dominance, and the contest was a tie. It seemed to reduce the Namibian dunes to their basic, but most important elements – sand and sky.

A few months later, we were pleased to learn that our dabblings in minimalist art made it to the final round of judging in the Creative Visions of Nature category in the BBC Wildlife Photographer of the Year Awards. So the moral of the story is to definitely be aware of conventional elements of design and composition, but to be flexible enough to alter them as you see fit. Above all, don’t be afraid to break rules.

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Meet Robin & Arlene

Robin and Arlene are authors of 13 books, including bestsellers and award-winners, plus they have contributed travel writing and photography to well over 100 other publications around the world. read more...

Awards & Achievements

June, 2018: Our article Sleeping with Rhinos on Photojourneys won First Place for the Best Outdoor/Adventure Feature at the Travel Media Association of Canada awards.

February, 2018: Our photo of Saskatchewan’s William River received a Highly Commended award in the Habitat and Landscapes category of the WildlifePhoto.com international nature photography competition.

Photo Journeys was named among the 100 Best Travel Photography Blogs on the web by FeedSpotJune, 2017: Our photo of two Alaskan Brown Bears fighting over prime fishing spots in Katmai National Park, Alaska won 1st place in the Best Action Photo Award in the Travel Media Association of Canada (TMAC) national awards.

May, 2017: Our photo was named a Finalist in the Siena International Photo Awards. The 2017 competition received 50,000 entries from 130 countries. The photo was of an Alaskan Brown Bear and salmon in Katmai National Park, Alaska.

February, 2017: Our photo of an Alaskan Brown Bear and salmon was awarded Highly Commended status in the Animal Behaviour Category of the 2016 WildlifePhoto.com competition. The image will be part of a photo exhibit at Big Screen Plaza in New York City.

June, 2016: Our photo of a brown bear fishing for salmon in Katmai National Park, Alaska, won 1st Place for the Best Action Photo at the Travel Media Association of Canada (TMAC) Awards.

Our photo of Bufflehead ducks in their spring mating ritual won Outstanding Achievement in the Best Action Photo at the same awards.

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2017 Bestsellers

Our book, The Great Saskatchewan Bucket List, topped the list as the Number One Bestseller on SaskBooks' (Saskatchewan Publishers Group) of Saskatchewan-published books for 2017. This was the 6th year in a row that the Bucket List was in the Number One spot.